Entering the final project year, Horizon 2020 project CARAT has now released an animated clip illustrating the project scope and its possible impact on cellular cancer treatments of the future. The short animation aims to showcase the project approach and goals in an easy-to-understand and entertaining format in order to inform interested non-professionals, patients and relatives about the latest scientific pathways and approaches to make CAR T-cell therapy more efficient and widely available.

The Eurice team is involved in CARAT as partner for project management as well as communication, dissemination and exploitation. As such, Eurice accompanied the complete production process of the clip which is now available on the CARAT project website and on YouTube.

Since the project launch in 2016, the eight interdisciplinary project partners from four European countries have collaborated to develop a safe and cost-efficient technology platform for advanced cellular therapies. In recent years, science has shown promising results: So-called CAR T-cells can be used to educate the patient’s own immune system to fight tumour cells. However, the technology behind this is still rather complex and not suitable for all patients. One of the main aims of the CARAT project has been to improve CAR T-cells and reduce the partly severe side effects. To make future treatments more efficient and affordable, the partners have been working on a platform to fully automate and standardise the manufacturing process of cellular products.

The film will also be showcased at the 45th Annual Meeting of the European Group for Blood and Marrow Transplantation (EBMT 2019) in Frankfurt, Germany on 24-27 March 2019. To watch it and find out more about CARAT and the researchers behind the scenes, visit the booth of CARAT coordinator Miltenyi Biotec at the EBMT. More information can be found here.